The Starbreeze Forums
and Atari
Forums for The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena each
have threads complaining about the game's DRM, describing a non-revocable
three-installation limit that does not allow further installations after it has
been reached. This has inspired another protest centered on the
reviews on the
Amazon listing for the game, where an increasing number of reviews complain
about the DRM. We contacted Atari about this and received the following response:

The protection on the PC version of The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault
on Dark Athena is an activation system with online authentication required the
first time you install the game on a machine. The activation code lets you
install the game on up to 3 machines, with an unlimited number of installs on
each assuming that you donít change any major hardware in your PC or re-install
your operating system.

If you reach the maximum number of installations you can contact the Atari
hotline and if itís a legitimate request you can get a new activation code.

We implement this protection in an effort to avoid early piracy.

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There is no benefit to the consumer for these DRM methods. None. And you just can't see it.

I never said it did, don't put words in my mouth. It's funny how you can never have a decent debate with someone on DRM without them acting like you love DRM, you think it's awesome. I don't like DRM, especially limited activations and "games as a service" B.S. like Valve throws out there. I would go as far as to say I hate DRM. The difference between you and I is only that I higher priorities than my hatred for DRM, like playing awesome games and supporting awesome developers. If you can't get that simple difference through your head I don't know what to tell you.

The reason to do it is because the system itself does it. Capitalism is all about self-interest. Profit at all costs, even if it hurts others. There is no altruism in capitalism. The greater good is whatever makes you the most money. In the case of customers, it's all about saving money. Publishers like Atari have no problem using worthless DRM to burden customers so why should customers give them anything? If Atari wants to make money, they need to give customers a good reason to buy their games. Preventing theft != making money. In the case of DRM, theft isn't prevented, money isn't made and customers aren't happy.

That's a pretty cynical view, and I'm saying that as a person whose girlfriend constantly admonishes for being too cynical.

Capitalism's main strength is competition and wanting more money, yes. You can view this as having no moral base, and that's you perogative, but I prefer to look at it as being rewarded for hard work with greater success and reward. When people circumvent the system and take your work without giving you anything in return, it breaks the system and removes your incentive. Greater effects could be the closure of a developer, the loss of jobs and resources... it's pretty immoral in my opinion. I'm sure pirates rationalize it to themselves that all those people care about is money, and are thus evil, but that's just B.S. they use to feel better. We all care about money, and we all want our work to be rewarded. Even a nurse or firefighter wants their paycheck and would be damn upset not to get it.

Any pirate would have a swift change of heart if they made something a ton of people used and enjoyed and got NO reward out of it. It's like a college liberal who realizes he's a conservative once he starts making money.

You don't need to beg, you just need to make a product that people want to buy. That's how capitalism works. This isn't about charity. People stealing your stuff doesn't mean anything. People will steal anything if they can get away with it. However, if you make a quality product, a lot of people will feel compelled to buy it. DRM does not compel people to buy stuff.

No one WANTS to buy anything, that's the problem. It's funny you have such a cynical view on capitalism but later on you seem to have this great optimistic view on humanity... make a good product and they will pay you for it. That's B.S..

People don't WANT to pay me for anything. They want to play a game, they want to watch a movie, they want to be rich someday, but the last thing they want to do is reward or pay me for doing anything.

I can't trust people to pay me for what I make anymore than the grocery store could trust people to pay on their way out and have no staff in the store to watch them. This idea that many on the Internet have of handing out your product and hoping people pay for it is ridiculous, and again if any of you were creators you would think much differently.